“I’ve always had bad reactions to all forms of anaesthesia,” I told the anaesthesiologist. “You should have all of my history in my file.”

He opened the file, his eyes scanning across the first page, which covered all the essential information. “Yes, I see. Local anaesthesia causing severe irritation, total anaesthesia causing major nausea in the 24 hours after…”

“Read on,” I said.

“You actually went into clinical death once, and it was directly linked to the methods used to put you under?” he said.

“Yeah. Can you do something about it? I’d rather not die,” I said.

“Sure. You’ll be on the table in four hours, I should be able to figure something out by then. The nurses should be in to tend to you soon,” he said.

I nodded in agreement, and he left my bedside. The nurses came to see me, and tended to me, to make absolutely sure I was ready for my operation. I just had to have been born with a neurological issue that required me to go under on a regular basis, and this visit to the hospital was nothing out of the ordinary for me. My brain was weird, but I could live a normal life eleven months of the year, just.

Minutes and hours ticked by, and I was undergoing final preparation, my designated surgeon came into my room. “Hi, Jordan. I’ve spoken to the anaesthesiologist, and after looking over your file, he wants to try an experimental method to put you under. It’s been approved for human testing, and we’ve had no complications with it yet, but since it’s only experimental, I need your consent to do it.”

“Is it going to stop me almost dying from the conventional thing?” I said.

“Yes, he thinks that it should work particularly well in your case,” the surgeon said.

“Then, yeah, bring the paper in. I’ll roll the dice,” I said.

The surgeon came back as quickly as he left, carrying a clipboard with a form. “Here. It’s yours to sign. I’ll stay here until you decide.”

I read the text of the form. *I, Jordan Tedeschi, hereby agree to use of experimental methods as defined in*, yadayadayada, *the Hospital agrees to cover unexpected expenses regarding medical care*. Excellent, I thought, that’s one problem less. After reading through it all, mostly standard legal stuff, I signed the form, and was left to be prepared.

They rolled me into the operation hall, face down to have a hole drilled in the back of my head, and the friendly anaesthesiologist spoke to me. “Are you ready?”

“Yeah, let’s get this over with,” I said, and with the mask on my face, they released the new anaesthetic.

I saw only pitch blackness, but I was definitely conscious. I couldn’t feel any part of my body, but my mind was in gear and working over-time. This was a new experience, I’d never stayed conscious after being put under. It came to me that my head was about to be drilled in, but I felt no pain or fear. All things considered, it actually felt kinda nice. Resigning to having three hours all to myself, I reminisced of Claire de Lune, and did what felt like humming, despite having no muscles with which to hum.

“Who’s there?” someone called out. It wasn’t a voice, since it wasn’t a sound, but more like a thought intruding into my thoughts, meshing with them. But it was very much real.

“I’m Jordan,” I said. “Who are you, and how are we talking?”

“I should ask you the same question,” the presence said. “I’m currently in an operation hall. I should be completely under.”

“That’s very curious,” I said. “I’m also in surgery. Are you real, though, and not just a figment of my brain working on overdrive?”

“I was the last time I checked, yes,” it said. “And I’m fairly sure you are, too. I’m Aaron, by the way. Nice to meet you.”

“Nice to meet you, I guess,” I said. He sounded Southern to me. I wouldn’t conjure up a Southerner in my mind. No, he was real.

“So how come we are talking?” he said.

“I’ve absolutely no idea. I’ve never had this happen to me,” I said.

“Neither have I. Listen, have they done something new to you? Like a new method of anaesthesia?”

“Tell you what, it’s exactly what they did,” I said.

“And have you had bad reactions?” he said, sounding excited.

“Oh, hello, Mr. Psychic,” I joked. “So what the hell is going on? Where are you?”

“I mean, I’m right here, talking to you,” he said.

“No, your body, where is it?”

“It’s in London. I presume yours is as well?”

“Yeah, I wonder how you’d guessed,” I said.

He… seemed to laugh, even though we weren’t really talking or laughing. I didn’t know what he looked like, but I felt a strange draw to him. I suppose that being robbed of our bodies helped, but I hadn’t even stopped to consider how utterly fucked up it was that we were able to talk to each other while being under.

“This is so weird, isn’t it?” I said, to no response. “Aaron?”

The space my thoughts were in fell silent. They must’ve woken him up, or he’d died on the op table. Either was possible, but for his sake and mine, I hoped that they’d woken him up. Left to myself again, I started thinking about music again, but solo piano was no longer the order of the day. My mind drifted to more discordant music, and to orchestral music, with instrument upon instrument meshing to create pure beauty.

As the hours ticked by, I was woken up just as I was getting bored. I felt my body again, and I felt weak. The predictable drone of medical machinery lulled me back into sleep, this time real, dreamless sleep.

When I woke up, it was night-time, and I cried out for water. A nurse was quickly in my room to provide, and when my body had had enough of its own functions, my brain once again had the capacity to think about what had happened while I was under. When morning came, I was let back on my feet, and I asked about EEG readouts from my operation. The neurologist just shrugged me off, saying he’d looked at them and that he had found nothing out of the ordinary. In fact, given my history with operations, he considered the experimental method to be a resounding success.

When I mentioned Aaron, he looked at me from behind his glasses. “Miss Tedeschi, I know you have a history of bad reactions to anaesthetics, but hallucinations are reasonably common. I’m convinced this Aaron figure was nothing more than your mind’s construction. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’m busy. Have a good day.”

To say that he was unhelpful would be an understatement. The same day, I was released home, and I immediately started looking for hospital records, hoping that they were available. I seemed to be the only one who knew that Aaron was real, and I was going to find him.